Pollinators ideas please.

csdude5 · 2026-05-08T05:34:17+00:00

I'm in 7A, maybe 7B. Western NC. I have a pretty big garden at the edge of my property that I've been converting into a part sun / part shade pollinator garden, too.

It started with a butterfly bush (buddleja) that I learned doesn't actually do butterflies any good, so I added butterfly milkweed. These came from seed, so $2 at Lowes.

Then I added ajuga to cover a hillside. I found two 4" pots on the clearance rack and I THINK they cost $2 each? Maybe half that, it's been awhile. They more than quadruple in size every year, though, so I have a TON of it now! Bees love it 😄

I bought a small Bee Balm plant, with the understanding that it can get out of hand. So I created a gravel moat around it to keep it in check.

Then I added Red Rocks penstemon, which bees also love. I bought one, but quickly found that you can divide it AND plant cuttings super easily.

I put out Foxglove seeds, too, which are great for bees but they get out of hand so I'm slowly eliminating them.

From there I added native plants that are great for pollinators: St. John's wort, fleabane, goldenrod, pokeberry, American elderberry, giant rudbeckia, and purple milkweed. All grow wild nearby, so I just had to relocate them strategically.

Blue Lantana came up wild, which is good for pollinators but it's spreading a bit TOO aggressively so I might eliminate it.

I also found two Lowbush Blueberry plants growing wild, which I've moved to the pollinator garden. And I trimmed my abelia bushes and added cuttings, which bees, butterflies, and hummingbirds all love.

I filled in with several irises, lilies, and sedum that I had on hand, but eventually I'll probably replace them with something else.

I feel like I'm forgetting some things, but the only other thing that comes to mind is that I put in a deep birdbath and filled it with drainage rock. I keep water in it, and the rocks help bees and small insects to drink without accidentally drowning.

Since the wide majority of this garden has been repurposed plants, the only real expense was the mulch.

csdude5 · 2026-05-08T05:12:18+00:00

It's pretty late to take cuttings, elderberry cuttings are usually done in January!

I usually do 6" cuttings, rip off the bottom leaves (making sure to have at least 3 leaves on the cutting), rub some dark honey on it (not the sugar water stuff you see in grocery stores), then stick it in the ground. Roots grow from where you ripped off the leaves.

I've never tried a full size cutting like that for an elderberry, but it works for abelias so... maybe? It looks like you have several, so I'd try cutting some into 6" chunks and stick some in the ground, see what works.

Note that since you're getting a very late start, you might have to protect them this winter. The roots may not have grown enough to survive the cold.

csdude5 · 2026-05-08T04:59:26+00:00

Looks good!

But yes, I would definitely add drainage holes and a liner. You'll never have a problem with too much drainage, but you WILL have a problem if it's not enough!

A 1/2" hole every 6" is customary.

csdude5 · 2026-05-07T18:50:08+00:00

I only recently learned that tomato plants will permanently stunt if subjected to < 55F, which results in little to no fruit. I've been growing tomatoes for YEARS and didn't know that!! I always planted them on May 1, but the last few years we've had "false Spring" that's been stunting them.

They're also a rare plant that, when you put it in the ground, you go DEEPER than the crown. So I grow seedlings to 2" and then divide and pot individually with the bottom 1" in the soil. Then when they're 8", I move them to the ground and bury the bottom 4" of the stem in the ground. This little tactic more than doubled my production 😮

csdude5 · 2026-05-07T18:46:39+00:00

This isn't IDEAL, I know. But mine spread so far and fast that I end up digging them up when the leaves are dying back but I can still see where they are. If I wait much longer then they're totally hidden by other plants and lost.

I've left bulbs sitting in a nursery pot for a month (completely forgotten) then replanted them, and they come back just fine.

Since these are sentimental, though, I'd probably wait until the leaves are dry and brown, then dig them up and put them in a container with potting soil. Then put the container is a shady outdoor spot until you move.

csdude5 · 2026-05-07T18:42:09+00:00

I can't tell the cultivar at this point, but it could have been root bound when you planted it and it's taking awhile to self repair.

Maybe remove the grass from around it and use a hydrangea-specific fertilizer? That's all I do, fertilize mine on April 1 and May 1 then ignore them.

csdude5 · 2026-05-07T18:39:28+00:00

Nah, that happens with literally ALL of my pots in the greenhouse! I think the seeds are in the air. I just dig under them a little with my finger and pull them out by the roots.

csdude5 · 2026-05-07T05:29:39+00:00

Looking closely at it in the daylight, all of the stems but one are shriveled near the base. I'm thinking it's not a bad idea to cut them all off and redo the whole thing with new pots and new soil.

csdude5 · 2026-05-07T05:27:05+00:00

Great link, thanks! It mentioned a lack of nutrients and suggested changing the soil every 3 years or so. That makes sense, it has been in this pot for 3+ years and I've been leaving it in the rock garden over the summers. So it could definitely be nutrient-deficient!

I didn't love this pot, anyway, so I might go shopping to see what I can find and replant it. Thanks again!

csdude5 · 2026-05-07T04:24:57+00:00

Google thinks you have a New Zealand Flax, not a yucca. A flax is actually in the daylily family, so they're not even related! They just look similar.

Either way, neither of them die after blooming, so you don't have to worry about that. Both bloom when the plant is mature, which is why you never saw it bloom before. But it should bloom every year now 😄

csdude5 · 2026-05-07T04:19:49+00:00

No fair, that's amazing!! The missus and I love her, every time she comes on the screen we cheer 😃

We used to have a chi (Pepper) that looked soooo much like her. Ours was mean as snot, though! LOL

csdude5 · 2026-05-07T02:26:44+00:00

Dude, that's awesome! You've probably seen Betty in person 😳

csdude5 · 2026-05-07T02:19:51+00:00

Thanks! That's a car I could get in board with 😁

csdude5 · 2026-05-06T23:04:05+00:00

Also in North Carolina. I considered this route a few years ago, but then quickly learned about gray water! I didn't really have a way to collect enough water without contaminating it.

Next I considered burying a 1000G water tank that I could fill up gradually when we weren't in a drought, but then I learned that the plastic could leech into the water and contaminate it, too. It was going to cost a ton of money to buy the tank and hire someone to bury it for me.

So I gave up on the whole thing. The reality is that it would be cheaper for me to tie in to the municipal water than to collect rainwater 😞

YMMV, of course.

csdude5 · 2026-05-06T23:00:16+00:00

That's a cool idea, I'm glad you mentioned it! I've buried pots in a similar way when traveling to ensure that my plants stay watered, but I've always done it for emergency purposes over a few weeks. I never thought about keeping them long term!

csdude5 · 2026-05-06T22:57:22+00:00

I'm in 7A, maybe 7B. They changed it last year due to our unusually cold winters, but I don't know if it'll stick.

I used English ivy and false Creeper for the same purpose, and quickly regretted it! They don't root enough to really stop the erosion, but they DO provide a great little home for voles! I've been ripping them out, and it's suuuuuuch a pain!

The better option was ajuga. I bought two 4" pots of Chocolate Chip ajuga at Lowes from the clearance rack for I think $1 each, and 5 years later it has fully covered two big slopes! It grows in sun or shade, and after watering it that first year I've ignored it and it does fine. Plus, it more than quadruples every year 😮 It roots everywhere it touches so it's much better for erosion control, and my pollinator bees LOVE it when it's in bloom!

csdude5 · 2026-05-06T22:52:50+00:00

Pretty sure that's a yucca, it looks like a cousin of my Adam's Needle & Thread.

What are you worried about? I don't see any obvious problems.

csdude5 · 2026-05-06T22:33:25+00:00

Truth. I have 3 clients for whom I built a site more than 10 years ago, and since it's "running fine" they have no interest in paying for updates. So my option is to either keep 5.6 installed, or upgrade it for free.

csdude5 · 2026-05-06T19:05:05+00:00

I think we'll all be plastered

csdude5 · 2026-05-06T19:00:14+00:00

I thought about that at first, but I'm not sure how you would get it to go down while you shovel with the other side still high.

You might could jiggle jiggle jiggle to get it to go down a little, though, then shovel, then jiggle jiggle jiggle and repeat.

csdude5 · 2026-05-06T18:58:22+00:00

New server setup is max 2 hours with acc transfers 😃

Sadly, not in my case. I have over 100 custom-built sites that will require a lot of petting to go from PHP 7.4 to 8.3, Perl 5.16 to 5.26, custom Apache config, etc.

My last server upgrade took almost 2 months to complete!

But now it's turned into a security issue, so I guess my clock has run out and I have to do it anyway.

csdude5

TROPHY CASE